A highly volatile commodity made of thin air that nobody actually needs could have been the answer to our prayers.

Doesn't take much imagination.  I'm doing it and living more comfortably than my parents did at my age.

Watched about half of it. And I bet at the end they won’t correlate that the more the government subsidizes stuff the more it goes up. The student debt rate they posted after Obama federalized student loans for example. The detachment of the dollar from gold in the 70’s etc..

First house was $49k with a 8.5 apr in 1991. I made $2000 a month (E3)and the house payment was $400.

Car payment was $160 a month, my hobbies were skydiving and I sold my AR for a used 1987 parachute.

I would make 4-5 jumps a month at $12 a jump.

I was pretty poor but happy. Ex wife bought me a new set of field boots for Christmas

The goalposts have moved.  Houses have gotten bigger even as family sizes have gone down.  I will acknowledge that the house size situation affects even those who don't want to play by the new rules because nobody is building the smaller homes of yesteryear.  Cars last much longer than they used to, but people want a new one every year or two.  

I've seen people here say they can't afford to have a third kid because they would have to add a bedroom so each could have his own.

Yep!  Your numbers pretty much jive up with mine.

Since I am 52 now, I get to sink $30,500 into my 401K this year.

Soooo…. $80K/$150K =  53.3% …. That’s what you get to see.

Even there. Look up Fredonia Arizona on the map. I looked at a house by Main Street. I thought in podunk Fredonia the little old 3 bedroom on a corner lot might be 175-200K WRONG!  Over 300K. I’m talking older nothing fancy even a bit run down. I have seen mobile home lots in Bullhead city AZ for under 40K. But it’s hot as f*ck in the summer time. Like 120’ hot. It can be done but you’re not going to be in any really nice or more popular places. But I also think the expectations have been raised to high. Big city suburban living might have to move to the country. Take that teaching degree to BFE Kansas.

$2,000 a month, as an E-3, in 1991?

That had to be everything including BAS, VHA, etc…., right?

I know it shocking but when $1 is devalued so is 100,000 of those dollars.
When $1 only buys you half what is used to.. $100,000 probably buys less too or something..

Bullshit, wo is me talk.  Inflation has been much higher in my life time. STAGFLATION sucked too.

I'd venture to guess that 3K sq ft is above the average house size, 50 acres is nothing to sneeze at :)

I, of course, appropriately, look down at you, with my multiple helicopters (lost count) and residential landing pads (think I hear one coming in now, must be the top-tier bikini models and world's 1st, 2nd, and 3rd finest chefs (I like Spam sandwiches!)

Awesome you're able to support your kid's hobby / future career!

Be me.

Millenial.

Zero inheritance or parental help. They’re poor as you can get in America. Raised in shitty area- but not the ghetto.

Dropped out of high school. Got GED later.

Spent many years being pretty close to very poor as I learned the trade. Have to constantly buy tools that are expensive AF.

Had kids while poor. Choose to be super frugal so kids could stay with mama.

Had ONE car, ONE phone between us for a lot of years.
Didn’t eat out. Budgeted, planned, and prioritized so we could have fun, do things with kids. Camp, museum, zoo, etc.

Made lots of dumb mistakes and financial missteps, no huge ruinous ones. Had first kid at 18, probably pretty hard way to start.

Hard to save money for bigger things. Kept doing it. Waited. Don’t drink, smoke, or do drugs. Don’t hang out with shitbags.

Very modest house bought six years ago for 130k. Rural, inconvenient, cheap. Friend helped us with some extra cash for down payment so we could jump on the good deal before the market start going back up. Sold lots of shit in a fire sale to make up the difference.

Saved friends ass when he got laid off during Covid and crashed with us for two years.

Paying 5% on 30 year fixed rate.

3+ acres. Chickens, dogs, kids, garden, backyard fort, front porch swing.

Three rock solid vehicles- 18 year old payed off car, 18 year old payed off 3/4 ton pick up, 10 year old nice Jeep with a few years left before it’s “mine”. Dirt bikes. Project cars. 16 year old has his own car. Crappy boat that runs and floats. Couple of trailers. Some guns. Some gear for hobbies. Nothing new, I try to buy solid, smart things that work and last.

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows everyday. Mentally taxing, honestly I have a lot of trouble with depression and laziness. I had kind of a rough childhood, and I’m not over it. I had some good role models and some bad ones. I could be way better, and I constantly feel I could and should do more for my family.

I was blessed with opportunities and took them. Ive been blessed with more than I can ever be properly cognizant and thankful for, but it certainly wasn’t money. I didn’t get here with some sweetheart deal or rich parents. Significant sacrifice, work, and smart use of debt.

Literally “living the dream” I dreamt of 10 or 15 years ago. The “American dream”?- no. Mine.

Bitched the entire time getting here.

Still better yet to come. Hoping to start my own business soon, work for myself.

Make $70k doing blue collar work. wife makes about $30k. That’s your  $100k gross household income. (That’s now, made nowhere near this while climbing the ladder)

Just Got back from vacation to go see the eclipse last week with the family. Housework is caught up so I took a quick ride today after work. Going to take the middle boy out shooting tomorrow, as is our tradition every Patriot’s Day. Little one has play rehearsal, big one has work.

It’s doable. Do it.

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I didn't realize driving a 30-40k car and not drinking Starbucks was the American dream.

The American dream died with fucking entitlement, residual entitlement that was pumped full force into the MTV era (80's was best decade) youth; Cool cost money and whatever you want whenever you want (Walmart eventually propagated that notion at the poverty level).

80's was the last decade that when shit broke you paid to have it fixed, or bought the parts yourself and fixed it yourself.

Opra: Everybody gets a brand new car, everybody gets a $1,200 phone, everybody gets a 65" TV...

Fucking plastic America, can't smell the shit on it's own knees.

E-3 in 1991 with over 2 years service is $926.40 a month. Couldn't find 1991 BAH rates.

What if I told you that's not a revelation?

You live like a King!!

@JLPettimoreIII

AVOCADO TOAST!

GRILLED CHEESE!!

$100K equals ~$70K take home. That’s a decent salary, depending on the area, but it ain’t big money these days. You can raise a family on that income, but you won’t have a whole lot of disposable income leftover.

$6K/month doesn’t go as far as it used to.

Ditto.

A single wide on 20 acres out in the sticks was $150K four or five years ago.

A decent little 2 bedroom house on ~3 acres was around the same price.

Shit’s expensive these days.

When you use a set salary like that as part of a discussion, the first thing you have to keep in mind, is that making $100,000 in LA can mean really different things when you are taking about Los Angeles versus lower Alabama.

My wife and I are retired on $110,000 in income (and, I know a lot of people making less than that who seem to be doing fine).  We have a three bedroom two bath home five blocks from the ocean.   We even have enough money to eat out twice a week with friends.

But, I have no doubt that there are a whole lot of places in the US where we would be in real trouble trying to live on $110,000.   So we don't live in any of those places.

And, our town, frequently makes all of the magazine lists as one of the ten best beach towns in the US.  

It's one of these towns, but I won't say which one.

https://www.southernliving.com/souths-best/beach-towns

Our only problem is a lot of blue staters are starting to "discover us".


But, the moral of the story is, where you live matters.

And pull yourself up by your bootstraps.

About right.   That gross salary starts to drop pretty quickly once one factor in taxes and deductions for retirement.

And you paid that? That's not how you save to achieve the American Dream. Oh, I know, you worked hard this week and deserved a treat.

I spent a lot of years renting a couple movies at Blockbuster for $5 on Friday evening, and cooking a bag of Orville Reddenbacher in the microwave. That was the entertainment for the weekend.

If we just raise minimum wage a little more we can fix this! Come on, join the fight for $50!

Yeah it’s pretty easy.  I could do it on half the amount listed.  It is as hard as you make it.

Less than $100k to be comfortable in LOTS of places.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/personalfinance/the-salary-a-single-person-needs-to-live-comfortably-in-every-u-s-state/ar-BB1lIQeD?ocid=hpmsn&cvid=f924084d30c742a2833cdb80a43a1878&ei=10

exactly -- details matter

$100k married w/ two kids in daycare in Northern Virginia ??  not good

$100k for a single dude living in rural South -- doing great

even a family would be fine on $100k in much of the South -- save the trendy urban locations like Charlotte, Nashville, Atlanta, etc which are pricier

Mindset and discipline matter.  I’m a JH teacher.

My cell phone is six years old.  My Roth is maxed every year.
I brew my own coffee.  My 17 year old’s 529 is $128k.

I could go on and on.  I’m not bragging about the wealth we’ve acquired in the last 20 years, I’m bragging that I get my work clothes from Goodwill.

to be fair, tickets were likely 5 bucks each, the popcorn and drink were 20 EACH.

Dumb! They’re citing large and ultra expensive cities as the basis for the cost of living. Places like Charlotte or Raleigh are going to be exponentially more expensive than small town or backwoods North Carolina. I’m sure that’s true of every state. In many places across the U.S. you could live very well on that kind of money. There are some out of the way places where you could live like a dictator on the same dough.

Another day of whining.
😢😢

GD - people make poor financial decisions and bitch about not being able to afford a home.


Same GD - PSA and holosun are for poors.  DD all the way & ACOGs on my 10.5 sbr, my 14.5, and 16" rifles.

Also if you don't spend $500  bucks a month on ammo training it's your funeral buddy

You poor sons-a-bitches need to start watching some Dave Ramsey videos.

Life is as hard as you make it.

Learn to say no!
Don't spend what you don't have!
Stop feeding your ego with big purchases!

You put yourself in this situation, get yourself out.

Your crying has entertained me though.  🤣🤣

This is peak Poe’s law from new members

These threads all follow the same pattern.

The issue isn't you can't live on 100k. The issue is you can't live in 100k and buy the house and car you have in today's dollars.

How much did you pay for your house? How much is it worth?

My first home I bought in 2012 I paid 152k for at 3% interest. With property taxes, insurance and a modest down payment  my mortgage was $900/mo.

That same house just sold 10 months ago for $378k, property taxes have quadrupled, and interest rates are over 7%. That houses mortgage is now over $3,600/mo. Now had I still lived there I am not freaking out about the current market. But if I'm in the market and trying to start out I can see the issue.

Same goes for me even today. I signed the contract to build my current house in Oct 2019. $462k and with property tax my mortgage is $3000 on the nose.

This same floor plan with these options is now $680k with the same builder, and interest is 7.5% os something like that. If I bought the exact same house I have now, but today instead of Oct 2019, my mortgage would be $6300. Over double.

I'm glad I'm not in the market. I make over $150k and frankly even paying $50k for a freakin' tiny ass RAV4 was painful because five years ago it would have bought the next size up Lexus model.

Keep scrolling. I posted the house.

Thankfully in my 30’s I came to the realization that living “small” (within my means) wasn’t losing the game. Wife realized it sooner than I did.

Now we just kinda chuckle at peaple who are stuck in the quicksand of debt they’ve made for themselves trying to impress peaple who in the long run could care less about them.

Had to have a couple fun conversations with my wife’s parents who expressed disappointment in us because we didn’t have a lake house, boat and McMansion like their friends kids, they had trouble understanding we’re walking a different path.

The idea that most people can’t take a 2k hit to their finances just makes me shake my head. That’s less than our discretionary  fund each month and in many cases we make less than they do. Guess it makes a difference when you decide to put it in the bank and not spend it on Starbucks.

The real problem is that now-a-days to earn $50k in discretionary income you need an almost $100k salaried job. After taxes, 401k contributions, health/dental and other deductions, etc. almost half your paycheck is gone. High home prices, high automobile prices (new and used), high college tuition costs, high interest rates, high cost of everything thanks to rampant inflation, etc. just means your net income doesn't go as far as it needs to.

Just like mom used to say.

And make your bed every morning.

Jokes on the future cat owners as they will need to eat the cat food themselves,, that are just too ignorant of reality to understand it, much less see it coming. They better enjoy the carousel while they can as the amusement part is on a path to go dark.

Cars last longer now?  I’m not sure I agree.

I haven't had reason to pay attention to the real estate market in the last decade since my wife and I bought our home 11 years ago....but I'm moving my elderly mom from California to live near us here in western Wisconsin and have been looking at rentals lately. I figured I'd easily find a nice rental for $1,200 ish per month since my area isn't some high demand metro...can't find anything for rent for less than $2k/mo, and nicer rentals are closer to $2.5k-$3k/mo for 2-3 bedroom townhouses. Of course, that's a lot cheaper than where she lives (SoCal) where we couldn't even touch a 2 bedroom rental for under $3,500-$4,500/mo (which is why she is begrudgingly moving to where I live).

Because people vote with their feelings and not their brain.

When they TELL YOU they are going to increase the cost of energy and give away "free shit", WTF did you think was going to happen?  The cost of energy effects everything and "free" isn't really free.

And people believe if you put democratic in front of socialism it'll somehow work this time.

Wife and I pull in about 60k combined. There’s zero way we could buy a house that’s even semi-local to our places of work today. At minimum our housing costs would go up by 50%, more likely closer to 100% not including utilities.

Central banking
big pharma
big goverment
Military Industrial complex
Fake education
Wallstreet financialized everything....


should mostly cover it

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$100K??   If you don't live in a big city, and make good decisions with your money.......$100K will get you a great life.

The problem is, most people blow their money on stupid stuff.  Buying a monster house in a fancy neighborhood, having a 60" TV in every room, eating out all the time, dumping hundreds at the bar every week, buying $60K+ vehicles and other toys, every device/streaming subscription you could think of, racking up huge CC debt and not paying it off, etc, etc........and they end up living check to check just to keep up with their debt payments.

It's all about priorities. If you want to make everyone think you are rich on $100K....you will go broke. If you live within in your means, $100K will get you a great life.